"We know what the rules are now," Mainieri said. "We've got to win four in a row to get through the bracket. It's very doable; you've just got to go out and play. We've got to play better than we did Sunday night. If we can do that -- we can't look beyond Tuesday. And we've got a really tough team to face on Tuesday.

"So we've just got to go back to playing good fundamental baseball and play better on Tuesday and hopefully get a win and get to play again on Thursday."

The number one seeded Tar Heels suffered a huge setback losing to North Carolina State, 8-1.

North Carolina State ace Carlos Rodon pitched eight shutout innings and held the Tar Heels to five hits Sunday.

"You have to rely on the leaders on your team to rally and they've been able to do that all year long," Carolina coach Mike Fox said. "It'll be another really good team, and we'll obviously have to play better. I have confidence in my guys. It's disappointing today. I have no doubt we'll be ready Tuesday."

North Carolina will start freshman pitcher Trent Thornton (11-1, 1.28 ERA). Thornton has five starts on the year and eight saves out of the bullpen.

The LSU-UNC winner will play either UCLA or North Carolina State at 7 p.m. Thursday.